Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations

Indictments Announced In Federal Probe Into ‘Nationwide Conspiracy’ Over Opioid Marketing Tactics

Along with the indictments, two Insys Therapeutics sales employees have agreed to cooperate with officials in the investigation, a signal that feds may be moving closer to building a case against executives at the drug company.

The New York Times:
5 Doctors Are Charged With Taking Kickbacks For Fentanyl Prescriptions
In March of 2013, Gordon Freedman, a doctor on Manhattan’s Upper East Side, fielded a request from a regional sales manager for the manufacturer of Subsys, a spray form of the highly addictive painkiller fentanyl. Dr. Freedman was already a top prescriber of Subsys and also one of the company’s paid promotional speakers. Now the sales manager was telling him the company, Insys Therapeutics, would increase the amount of money it was paying him and asked that he increase the number of new patients he was prescribing Subsys. (Weiser and Thomas, 3/16)

Stat:
Former Insys Employees Agree To Cooperate With The Feds In Kickback Probe
Two former Insys Therapeutics sales employees have agreed to cooperate with a federal government probe that prosecutors have described as a “nationwide conspiracy” to profit from illegally distributing an opioid medication. Jonathan Roper, a former district sales manager, and Fernando Serrano, a former sales representative, also pleaded guilty to paying kickbacks to doctors in order to boost prescriptions for the Subsys painkiller, which contains fentanyl, a powerful and addictive opioid, prosecutors said Friday. In addition, the feds disclosed indictments of five New York doctors for taking kickbacks. (Silverman, 3/16)

The Associated Press:
Q&A: Holding Drugmakers Accountable for the Opioid Crisis
Hundreds of communities in the U.S. are suing the makers and distributors of opioid painkillers, arguing that the companies should help pay the enormous costs of the deadliest drug epidemic in U.S. history. Since 2000, more than 340,000 Americans have died from overdoses of opioids, which include prescription painkillers and illegal drugs like heroin. The financial toll has been estimated at $500 billion in 2015, according to the latest White House figures, which include deaths, health care, lost productivity and criminal justice costs. (Perrone, 3/18)

In other news on the epidemic —

The New York Times:
Palliative Care Film Challenges Stereotypes About Opioids
“Hippocratic,” a documentary about the life of Dr. M.R. Rajagopal, India’s leading advocate of palliative care, is now touring the United States — a country where attitudes toward pain relief have changed because of the overdose epidemic. Dr. Rajagopal’s chief message — and that of the film — is that the essence of care for the dying is simple compassion. His inspiration came from Mahatma Gandhi, said Dr. Rajagopal, who in 2014 won a global award from Human Rights Watch for his activism. (McNeil, 3/16)

Nashville Tennessean:
Nashville Company Battling Opioid Addictions Raises $8 Million
180 Health Partners, a Nashville-based behavioral health company battling the opioid epidemic, has raised $8 million to fund its expansion and help mothers and newborns in more states. 180 Health Partners, led by CEO Justin Lanning, provides access to medical and behavioral health care to pregnant mothers struggling with opioid use and helps them give birth to healthy babies. (McGee, 3/18)

Columbus Dispatch:
Program Aims To Help Opioid-Addicted Parents Keep Kids
The START project (Sobriety, Treatment and Reducing Trauma) is primarily funded by $3.5 million in federal grant money passed through Ohio Attorney General Mike DeWine’s office. The goal is to keep children of drug-addicted parents at home and out of foster care, provided their parents undergo the treatment, counseling and other hard work required to get and stay clean. (Lane, 3/18)

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